Blocking an unfavorable amendment in 19 days
The client faced the risk of a sudden change in interchange fees. Thanks to a quick intervention in the economic committee, it was possible to modify the project provisions before it hit the second reading.
PayStream Solutions is a Polish payment operator serving over 1,340 online stores. In May 2024, the company faced a legislative crisis that could have destroyed their business model overnight.
The challenge
During work on the amendment to the Payment Services Act, a rider appeared in the parliamentary committee changing the rules for calculating margins for cross-border transactions. For PayStream Solutions, this meant a decrease in profitability of 12.4%, which translated into a real loss of 430,000 PLN net per year.
The company's management learned about the problem on Thursday evening, and the second reading in the Sejm was scheduled for Tuesday in two weeks. The company did not have legal analyses or access to the rapporteur MPs. They risked new law coming into force in a form that would force them to fire 4 developers from a 23-person team.
Our approach
We acted precisely. We assigned Robert Kwiatkowski, who has known the corridors of Parliament for 11 years, to the case. First, we prepared a 7-page technical report that showed in black and white that the planned amendment would hit not big banks, but local technology companies.
Within 96 hours, we held 4 meetings with legislative advisors and a key MP from the Economy and Development Committee. We focused on hard data, not emotions. We showed that the change would hamper the export of Polish digital services to neighboring countries in the region, which clashed with the government's declared strategy.
The solution
We proposed alternative wording for the disputed article. Instead of fighting for total deletion of the entry, which was politically impossible, we introduced a progressive mechanism. This allowed the regulator to announce success in the fight for lower costs for consumers while protecting the margin of companies like PayStream.
Our team developed the final text of the amendment in two variants. We handed it to the Sejm legislative bureau on Monday morning. During the committee session on May 14, one of the MPs submitted our version as an auto-amendment. It was adopted by a vote of 17 to 4 with 2 abstentions.
Results
Thanks to a quick reaction and knowledge of parliamentary mechanisms, the client avoided financial losses and maintained operational liquidity without having to renegotiate contracts with counterparties.
Timeline
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May 8, 2024Detection of dangerous amendment in the draft act.
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May 10, 2024Preparation of a report on regulatory consequences for the fintech industry.
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May 12, 2024Consultations with advisors of the Economy and Development Committee.
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May 14, 2024Voting on the rescue amendment at the committee session.
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May 21, 2024Enactment of the act in a safe version by the Sejm.
"We know how to code, but politics is black magic to us. Suprasorte stepped in when we had a knife at our throat. They knew exactly what to say and who to show our calculations to. Without them, we would have lost our annual profit."